The Doctor *** (1991, William Hurt, Christine Lahti, Elizabeth Perkins, Mandy Patinkin, Adam Arkin, Charlie Korsmo, Wendy Crewson, Bill Macy) – Classic Movie Review 8773

Director Randa Haines’s polished 1992 drama The Doctor stars William Hurt as rich, uncaring, selfish San Francisco surgeon Dr Jack MacKee (favourite phrase ‘get in and get out’), who finds that he too is faced with uncaring surgeons when he is diagnosed as having throat cancer.

Haines’s comedy drama is well meaning and professionally assembled but it is also glossy and manipulative. It comes with a series of downsides. The moral (that all doctors will be patients in 30 years) is too heavily laid home. The characters are too stereotyped – nice but frozen-out wife Anne MacKee (Christine Lahti), remote son Nicky (Charlie Korsmo), corrupt fellow surgeon Dr Murray Kaplan (Mandy Patinkin), all-seeing fellow patient June Ellis (Elizabeth Perkins). And Hurt’s transformation is too sudden and and complete, harming conviction and credibility. But the story is a good one, and Hurt is very watchable in an enormous star role.

Robert Caswell’s screenplay is based on Dr Ed Rosenbaum MD’s 1988 story, A Taste of My Own Medicine. Beware graphic MASH-style operation scenes.

Also in the cast are Adam Arkin, Charlie Korsmo, Wendy Crewson, Bill Macy, J E Freeman, William Marquez. and Kyle Secor.

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 8773

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